Merchant Account Approved with Full Balance Hold?

It’s becoming more and more common these days, for a credit card processor to approve a merchant based on their volume, average ticket, and industry…and then put a Full Balance Hold on the account until certain additional terms and conditions are put in place. Nearly always, this concerns the card not present merchants on the Internet. A website is up, but the credit card processor doesn’t feel that there is adequate protection for both you and them in the form of “disclosures”. In other words, credit card processors place holds on funds primarily due to risk. This risk comes in the main form of merchant engaging in practices which historically are proven to cause card holders transacting with the business to “chargeback” or “dispute” transactions. These things cause risk for processors and you as a merchant!

First you need to understand that: merchant accounts are not depository accounts like checking and savings accounts. They are basically a “line of credit.” When a customer pays with a credit card, a bank is extending credit to that customer and making the payment on his/her behalf. Additionally, processors pay merchants before the banks collect from customers and are therefore extending credit to the merchant. That’s why they charge you a “discount and transaction” for this service. Essentially, credit card processing companies act as middlemen between banks and merchants and accept responsibility for issuing debits and credits between the two. In fact, Chargeback scenarios are one of the most common ways that processors suffer losses; however, merchant fraud is also a great concern.
In summary, credit card processors place holds on merchant funds in order to shield themselves from the risk of chargebacks because the merchant did not properly disclose their terms of doing business.
So they we are. You have been approved. You have a website. You can’t use the merchant account because they will hold all your funds, until, you’ve made certain changes.

Typical reasons for this are:
• Return and Refund Policies not published
• Delivery Method and Timing not published
• Privacy Policy Statement not published
• US Based Address and Phone Number not displayed on every page
• Card Logo Display Requirements dependent upon the cards you take.
• Secured Server (SSL/TLS/SSH) and/or Gateway Issues, either you don’t have one, or you need to get one, or you don’t have it integrated properly
• Hosting in a non-USA country and not having all pages in “https” due to no SSL Certificate installed or having such improperly installed. Typically, this is eliminated with a proper gateway.